Unexpected Literary Connection: Dorothy L. Sayers

Has it happened to you? You’re visiting someplace like a park or a museum or a brewery when suddenly there’s an “unexpected literary connection,” an out-of-the-blue reference to an author.

Like at the Guinness Storehouse in Dublin. In a fascinating exhibit illustrating the company’s advertising campaigns over the years is a mention of mystery scribe Dorothy L. Sayers, who penned a verse for one of the beer titan’s most colorful and memorable ads while working at a London advertising agency.

“If he can say as you can
Guinness is good for you,
How grand to be a Toucan:
Just think what Toucan do!”

Sayers drew on her stint at the ad agency for the page turner Murder Must Advertise, having well-off sleuth Lord Peter Wimsey work as a copywriter while he investigates the death of one of the company’s employees.